Author's Preface
The sounds of shuffling feet resonated throughout the room. The white walls gave Michael a headache. He wasn’t sure if it was a bad sleep or what Jewel told him the night before. “Maybe those two are related,” he grumbled.
Looking down from the ledge, he oversaw the outlaws who were training themselves in order to be of use to the organisation. He smiled at their mercenary ideals. His mouth quickly regained its normal expression. He closed his eyes. The drowsiness he experienced pushed his body to the floor. He felt strangely weak today. The idea of trying not to get into fights for the third day in a row crept into his mind.
The few people training below him were the ones he recognised, even if they had only been on a mission together a few times before. They were the most trusted out of the rascals Andrew and Barry took in. Splinters lay on the ground beside the wood dummies they came from. A healer was tending to one of the trusted’s wounds. It seemed they had gone ahead and hosted a duel between the three of them.
Michael jumped from the railing, his baggy clothes flopping and settling back down when he landed with the squeak of his sneakers.
“Stake, Juggernaut, and Stain…” Michael smiled. “I thought I said that we were to conserve our abilities in fighting our enemies.” The smell of ozone emanated from him as electricity crackled.
Stake, the tall one dressed in a plain grey tank top and now-torn black sweatpants, looked away. He was the one being tended to by the healer. His curly hair made two buns on the back of his head, which looked amusing when he wore his favourite grey cap. He stood out, being the darkest coloured of the three.
Stain, a rather short but chiselled girl, opened her mouth to speak, but hesitated when she made the mistake of looking at Michael in the eyes. She wore red rectangular shades that looked as if they would fall off if she looked down, a black tee, and a bright red blazer, coupled with rust-red skintight trousers. She covered her face and looked to the side while holding a cough.
Juggernaut, a brown, muscled, and huge bald man, towered over Michael. He stood unmoving. Nothing but his irises trembled before Michael.
Michael never questioned Barry’s choice for the best of the rookies. They were the best for a reason after all. He quelled the zapping around him. “Where’s Overseer?” he asked Juggernaut.
The giant answered in a deep, gruff voice: “Usual place, in the training area.”
Michael nodded tersely. “Do not be an idiot again,” he said, tapping Juggernaut’s chest twice. The giant shivered, as if expecting an electrocution.
The three toppers sighed when Michael opened the rightmost door. “He’s scarier than Firefly,” Stake said nervously. He adjusted his cap, looking at his two companions. “I’ve never seen him that angry,” added Stain.
[…]
Michael found Overseer sitting at his desk. The man seemed in a daze. He was short, dressed in a white leather coat with red accents. A bit of his red shirt could be seen through the gaps. Of course, he wore his favourite coat. Overseer looked at the ceiling with his head hanging back. His round, red glasses reflected the singular bright ceiling light.
Overseer opened his eyes and looked at the visitor. “Michael! My favourite employer,” he said with glee as he adjusted his seating position to appear more professional.
Michael hid his surprise; the old man was rarely this joyous. “Something good happened?” Michael asked him. He sat down on a chair, adjusting his crude cloth mask.
Overseer smiled, which creeped Michael out. “There’s this new drug circulating the deadlands. I managed to get me a gram,” Overseer explained with giggles.
Michael scrunched his nose. “A gram?” he asked. How could only a gram make this addict so geeked?
Overseer shook his head. “I only took a tenth of the amount,” he chuckled.
Michael raised his eyebrows in surprise. He decided to abandon this topic. He shifted his right leg to the top of his left.
“World-class heroes are coming to America to hunt the top three villains,” Michael started, “I obtained this information from Vector. She was given the same task by the Japanese union.” Michael didn’t want to call Jewel by her name, even if it was public knowledge.
Overseer didn’t speak for a moment. His grin was frozen for those long seconds before it melted to a deadpan expression.
“Already?” Overseer asked. He didn’t wait for Michael to answer. “This was bound to happen, yes. But logically, it would be when you and Mimic engage in a brawl that would significantly weaken the powerhouses,” he gave his view. Michael nodded. “If they start targeting us before we find H.A.V.C., we will have enough manpower to defend against them. However, this would lead to H.A.V.C. exterminating us once we are weak enough,” Michael said, “Old man, we need to prioritise the search for H.A.V.C. I will not die by the hands of some second-rate villain.”
Overseer understood what Michael meant: if they started attacking H.A.V.C., the heroes would make Mimic crumble first before making their move on Black Flag.
Michael looked at Overseer as the old man’s gears turned. “You will stay here to defend Black Flag in case of attack. Firefly and Vector will start exploring the deadlands to zone in on any traces of H.A.V.C. Marrow will go with either Juggernaut, Stain, or Stake with a road vehicle,” the old man spoke slowly as the plan formulated in his head, “DC is the only place I can survey full-time with my current capabilities, as you know.”
Michael did not doubt Overseer’s plans even in this suboptimal state. He had already faced the repercussions of ignoring the strategist before.
He got up from the chair. “Inform those involved,” Michael instructed. He left the room.
“America is finally getting chaotic again,” Michael whispered to himself before coughing. “… Maybe that’s not a good thing.”
[…]
There were strong winds that evening. Barry’s eyes stung from the salt. He looked around, seeing a desolate harbour. There was only a handful of buildings that still had working lights, along with a single road that stretched from the main street to the dock. Two ships floated there, swaying with the angry sea. One had already sunk.
He jumped down from a container, looking towards the bright city behind him.
‘Can DC still be considered a city?’ he asked himself. He wasn’t born before or during the fall. Hell, he hadn’t even seen a proper city before. But he did see the ruins that circled it. He was right- DC is more of a town than a city.
Barry wandered through the lit streets of the city. Nobody was on the streets with him. He chuckled, “I guess I’ll get what's coming to me.”